Soccer: Posh destroy Southend

Southend United, so industrious and threatening in their previous league match - a 4-1 home win over Halifax Town - were brought crashing down to earth with a deafening thump by Peterborough United at Roots Hall on Saturday.

It would be easy to blame this single-goal defeat on Blues midfielder Mark Tinkler's mistake, which led to Posh wonderkid Simon Davies racing goalward and clinching all three points for the visitors with a first-half strike.

However, the blatant truth is that the Shrimpers were beaten by the better side.

Former Seasiders boss Barry Fry finally broke his Roots Hall jinx at the weekend, claiming his first points as an opposition manager in four attempts, but current Blues chief Alan Little will be left wondering what went wrong.

Little's men never got going, in a contest correctly billed as the Third Division's most glamorous fixture of the day, which pulled in over 6,000 punters.

The Southend supporters in the best-of-the-season crowd though, would have been disappointed at how Southend tamely surrendered their unbeaten home record.

Before this game the Shrimpers had won three games back-to-back, which had elevated them into fourth place in the table, but in all honesty they never looked like extending this sequence against Fry's foot soldiers, also hotly tipped for promotion.

The visitors played with more vigour and creative thought than their hosts, and could have been more than one goal up before the interval as they conjured up the best opportunities.

In reply, Southend, stifled by Peterborough's excellent midfield pairing of Davies and veteran Steve Castle, could not break down their well-drilled opponents and resorted to ineffective long-ball tactics as they grew more and more frustrated.

Blues could have played all day without scoring - as the Shrimpers' inability to pick-out in-form hitman Neil Tolson or his strike partner, former Posh man Martin Carruthers, cost them dear.

Time and time again Southend made steady progress down the flanks, but Gordon Connelly and Scott Houghton, who had a torrid time against his old club, failed to deliver a quality cross.

In fact, Peterborough's job was so simple, once they had taken the lead, that they were quite content to leave ten men behind the ball, as they quickly realised that Southend never had the tools to unlock their watertight rearguard.

However, Rome, or a promotion-winning unit, was not built in a day, and Little's men will face much easier opposition than Peterborough this campaign.

The Southend chief kept faith with the same set of players who were on duty against Halifax, with Martyn Booty, skipper Simon Coleman and Leo Roget again playing at the heart of defence, with Mark Beard and Nathan Jones at wing-back.

Connelly, Houghton and Tinkler were the three midfield men again and Carruthers spearheaded Blues' forward-line, partnering five-goal top scorer Neil Tolson.

Southend did take the attacking initiative against their visitors and Connelly fizzed a long-range shot inches over the bar, following good work from Tolson, after just eight minutes.

However, Peterborough, perhaps lifted by a less than volatile crowd, which usually greets Fry's return to the seaside, following his decision to quit Southend for Birmingham City six years ago, with screams of "Judas", soon claimed a hold on the game.

Five minutes after Con-nelly's effort, quick-thinking Posh keeper Mark Tyler caught Blues napping as he found the visitor's £3m-rated teenage left-winger Matthew Etherington with a clever throw.

The 18-year-old made a breathtaking run, before forcing a fine save out of Seasiders custodian Mel Capleton from just inside the Southend box.

From the resulting right-wing corner, taken by David Farrell, Tinkler made a superb goal-line clearance from Castle's powerful header, leaving Etherington with two bites at the rebound, which failed to find the target.

Carruthers replied by screwing a shot wide under pressure from former Blues defender Andy Edwards, who was a defensive rock for Peterborough, and Houghton hit a 20-yard free-kick straight down Tyler's throat.

Peterborough nearly broke the deadlock in controversial fashion after 26 minutes when their front-runner Andy Clarke, making his first start following a summer move from Wimbledon, bundled Booty off the ball right under the assistant referee's nose.

With Booty protesting for a definite foul, Clarke accelerated forward unmarked, but lost his nerve and hit the side-netting with only Capleton to beat.

Eight minutes later Tinkler cleared the bar as he stretched his head to Houghton's corner, but within another three minutes the usually impeccable midfielder was punished for a rare mistake.

Tinkler, suffocated by his Posh opponents in the centre of the park, which limited Blues' attacking options, looked on horrified as his forward pass was cut-out by Manchester United target Davies.

After killing the ball, the Welsh under-21 star found himself free to run 20 yards to goal, before coolly sliding the ball under Capleton, with Roget hot-on-his-heels.

Southend tried in vain to hit back three minutes before the break, but Carruthers' low-ball into the Peterborough penalty area was only half-hit by Houghton, under pressure from two visiting defenders.

The heart-stirring second-half comeback failed to materialise as any football the Shrimpers had attempted to play totally disintergrated.

Having run out of ideas, Southend began to launch the ball forward long at every opportunity, which played perfectly into the hands of the visitors' defence, especially substitute centre-half Phil Chapple.

Chapple, who replaced Matt-hew Wicks in the first-half and looked like a complete crock, was there for the taking if someone in Blues' ranks had been willing to run at him on the deck, but his weakness was never exposed.

It was 66 minutes before Southend came close to testing Tyler in a subdued second period, with Tolson heading a well-executed corner from Connelly over the bar.

Coleman lashed a shot past the left-post five minutes later after Carruthers had pulled back Jones' centre, but Peterborough were dangerous on the counter attack.

Their £300,000 hitman Howard Forinton drove wide following a storming charge forward and Castle had another header cleared off the line, this time by Jones.

Blues mustered one final chance, when substitute striker Neil Campbell headed Connelly's centre back across goal, but Coleman's thumping effort from 18 yards was superbly blocked by Edwards two minutes from time, killing off any last hopes of a reprieve.

You put your right leg in - Scott Houghton gives it his all to beat Dean Hooper to the ball

Pictures: LUAN MARSHALL

Match facts

Shots/headers on target: Southend 5, Peterborough 5.

Corners: Southend 8, Peterborough 5.

Bookings: Southend - Beard (29 mins, ungentlemanly conduct). Peterborough - Hooper (17 mins, foul).

Tyler 7, Hooper 6 (Scott 6), Drury 7, Wicks 5 (Chapple 7), Edwards 8, Farrell 6, DAVIES 9, Clarke 7 (Shields 6), Ethering-ton 7, Castle 8, Forinton 6. Subs not used: Griemink and Martin.

Peterborough Utd

(In 5-3-2 formation with ratings out of 10):

Capleton 7 - safe handling, but left exposed for the goal.

Beard 5 - struggled to get into the game.

Booty 7 - did his job.

Jones 7 - first class commitment to the cause.

ROGET 9 - another excellent all-round display.

Coleman 8 - solid and only just second best to Roget.

Connelly 6 - in and out, but never used when in space.

Houghton 5 - will be disappointed with his display.

Tinkler 6 - subdued game and suffocated at times.

Carruthers 6 - battled well, but never looked like scoring.

Tolson 6 - starved of service, but gave his all.

Subs:

Campbell 6 - replaced a tired Tolson for final ten minutes.

Morley 6 - came on for Beard for last ten minutes to mark return from a month injured on the sidelines.

Subs not used: Cross, Fitzpatrick and Spittle .

Southend Utd

Southend United (0) 0

Peterborough United (1) 1 (Davies 37)

Attendance: 6,187.

Referee: D Crick (Worcester Park) 4 out of 10.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.